


Pay With Blood Reprise.

by pamelaroseee



Series: Go Out & Love Someone [2]
Category: The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Dreams and Nightmares, F/M, M/M, Not Beta Read, Not Really Character Death, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-18
Updated: 2015-01-18
Packaged: 2018-03-08 01:21:49
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3190511
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pamelaroseee/pseuds/pamelaroseee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Peter as a baby with red chubby cheeks and his fat belly. Over there was Pepper with her sprayed in time 80’s up-do that he hated yet loved so much. Down there was Bruce with his kind eyes and always genuine smile. Here there was Rhodey, his new friend who he really wanted to know. Then, right before him, Steve with his morning eyes, barely open barely closed but his face made for his smile, the small ray of sunshine held between his cheeks. Lastly, there was Tony’s mother Maria, sitting off to the far corner of his mind with her arms wide as she embraced the young boy.</i>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p> </p><p>  <i>Tony wanted to remember these people as they were.</i></p><p> </p><p>Chapter 17 revisited from Tony's dreams and nightmares. How he remembers his family on last time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pay With Blood Reprise.

**Author's Note:**

> this won't make sense too much unless you read [the whole story](http://archiveofourown.org/works/1871190/chapters/4029486) but if you didn't ... you probably should.

“Hey there, sunshine,” Tony cooed as he thought about everything he wanted to remember.

“Hey,” Steve replied. “We’ve been over the procedure, yes?” Tony nodded. “We’ve discussed all that needs to be discussed, correct?” Tony nodded again. “Alright, we’re going to put you under, and when you wake up, you’ll be all better.”

“Will I see you?”

Steve’s eyes were locked onto Tony’s, his jaw clenched as he tried not to hesitate or too long. “I hope to God you do.”

His face was gone, the ceiling coming back into full view before the gas mask floated over to his mouth. The anesthesiologist began to talk, asking him to count back from ten. Tony counted, images of his family flashing before his eyes.

The beeping of the heart machine lulled in the background as the noise slowly nudged into the crashing of waves upon rocks. There was laughter, a small child, he assumed, running along the coast with other small children.

It all felt familiar, he thought. The clear blue sky, the blazing sun that was brighter than it was hot and the smell of the sea. He was lying on his back still, eyes protected with sunglasses he had no recollection of putting on but it only made sense that he did.

"Dad, watch this!" The voice of a small child yelled out and it was his own boy. Peter, yelling for attention as he slowly pulled himself up to his elbows. "Watch me do a cartwheel!" The boy yelled before taking a few steps back and lunging forward into the sand with hands raised above his head. His legs went bent while in air, catching his weight as he landed with arms still raised. He was barely five, small enough to still fit in his arms but big enough to not want to be held.

Tony smiled, throwing a thumbs up to the small child who continuously did it with two other children just his age.

"I love how outgoing he is," someone said beside him. Pepper, he recalled. Thinking of her words before she even had a chance to say them all.

It was a memory, his favorite of them all. They'd just bought the summer house, a sort of treat for Tony finishing treatment and finally kicking cancer right in the ass. This was their present, their gift to life for granting him a second chance and another attempt at seizing life.

"He gets that from you," Tony replied, reaching out a frail hand to his beloved wife. They were happy at this time, when he wasn't sick but still too weak to be reckless again.

Pepper snorts. "I highly doubt that, Mr. I can walk into a room and spark a conversation about cucumbers."

They laugh, they did that a lot then. "If I didn't, you'd be bored of me."

"Pfft," she laughs out, "Starks never shut up. Howard talks himself into circles, and your mother, bless her heart, she can go on and on about charities and benefits if you give her the chance. And never bring up Little Italy around her-"

"Alright, alright," he coughs, losing his breath more often than he used to. Those days were over though, no more coughing and groaning for hours from the pain.  Now, it was simply a cough. "He's amazing, Pep."

She grabs his hand, squeezing with all her might.

"You look tired, why don't you go inside and get some rest?"

Tony doesn't feel tired, he doesn't want to be away from the family he just got back. He wants to watch Peter chase the kids around, he wants to see them all build sandcastles and run into the waves just to see if their small frames could handle the force.

But his eyes began to droop, the weight of his exhaustion pushing down on his shoulders until he could barely take it anymore.

"Yeah," he finally answers, "that sounds good," he says as he slowly brings himself all the way up and begins to stand up. "Take pictures for me."

The images slowly come into his mind as  he begins to walk away. Peter running with a kite, Pepper and Peter with their faces pushed together into the frame, the sun setting over the horizon of their new backyard.

Tony remembers them all, he remembers them as they were on that day.

Stepping inside, he looked behind to lock the door only to turn around and see Pepper before a mirror. Her eyes glimmering and her skin as smooth as porcelain as she turned around to face Tony in her wedding dress.

"You're not supposed to see me,"

"Well, I'm not the groom this time so I can stare all I want," his eyes never moves from her face. She was beautiful, as gorgeous as the day her met her but more astounding each passing day. "You look so beautiful."

Pepper rushed to hug him. "I love you so much. I'm so thankful for you, Tony."

"I should pay for you to get married more often," he chuckled.

"I mean it, you mean so much to me and I'm proud of you. I'm happy for you."

Tony didn't know what to say, his lips twitching with a smile as she began to tear up. "Stop it, stop it, you're gonna mess up your make-up and I paid way too much for that face painting lady."

Pepper laughed, hugging Tony one more time. "Okay, get out, I have to finish getting ready."

Backing out, Tony looked at her reflection one last time before opening the door to what he believed to be Steve’s apartment.

It was spacious, wall to wall carpet with a recliner tucked into the corner right beside the couch. The television was mounted on the wall with a glass shelf planted right underneath it with his framed degree and photographs.

Tony slowly walks into the room, glancing at the window as the sun slowly began to rise. He walked slowly, carefully, as he reached Steve's room to still see him asleep. He was lying on his right side, his back bare and muscles relaxed. Tony reached for him. Running the tips of his fingers down his spine, his skin was soft under the touch.

"Go away," Steve mumbled into the pillow as he rolled away from the hand.

"Shhh," Tony hushed as he inched closer. He didn't have too many memories like this. He simply wanted to feel the man one more time. Taking his left arm, he ran his hand over the younger man's bare chest, pulling him closer just so he could feel the warmth that radiated from his skin. It was comforting, it was familiar, it was the one place in the world where he felt like he belonged and he didn't want to let it go.

Leaning down, Tony kissed his neck, whispering, "I love you."

Steve's lips pushed into a smile, a soft unapologetic grin that made everything feel just right.

"No take backs."

Tony chuckled, resting his face into a pillow as he slipped into something of a slumber. “Now why would I ever do that?” The silence swallowed him until the muffled sniffles were all that could be heard. Tony ran a hand over his face, the other hand cradling what once a goose feathered pillow. His teary eyed mother sat at the foot of his bed. He wasn’t asleep, he recalled, his lower body still halfway off the bed as if he’d thrown himself into the pillow rather than resting on it.

"Anthony!" She called for her son's attention, "I asked you if you loved him."

The young man couldn't comprehend. It was another memory, another nightmare from a time and place in his life he fought so hard to forget. Yet here he was, staring at his young mother with swollen eyes as she placed herself far away from her only child. The distance wasn't as wide as it was cold, harsh, and uninviting for him to even try to touch the woman who so happily and willingly gave him life and love up until this moment. Until this very moment Tony knew that she never loved him the same.

"I do, I love him and no one else because I don’t want to love anyone else. I’ve dated girls, I’ve tried with him but Billy makes me happy, he makes me happy and complete and I don’t want it any other way."

Her face was twisted with confusion and disgust and also pain. "You can't, honey. You can't love him. You won't. I forbid you to have anything to do with him and for as long as you live here, you can’t love him.."

And it was the air trapped inside his lungs that made so quiet. "I do, mom. I love him so much."

Maria held a hand to her mouth, the tears still sweltering as she physically ached to touch her son but only pulled further away. Tony remembers the disappointment so well that he feels his stomach doing somersaults, he remembers the cold shoulder and the instinct to want to be held by his mother only to receive a shake of the head as she shuffled away to the depths of her bedroom.

"Anthony," She gathered herself enough to tear away from the moment, her small feet shuffling towards the door as her son sat on his bed feeling the pain growing rapidly in his heart. "I won't tell your father," she stammered before dropping her head, "and neither should you."

There was the dagger in the chest, the ache being solidified for him to carry around like a tumor in his brain. His eyes were flashing red, his head spinning, huffing and puffing before letting out a disgruntled yell.

“Fuck you and him! Fuck both of you!”

He threw himself back into his bed, thrashing about for seconds before the pain began to settled. He was calm in a sense. Blinking the tears away, he found himself in another memory.

Hospital, with its beeping machines and bright white walls. He was alive, he assumed, alive and well without his parents in sight.

With a hand rubbing his eyes, rubbing both, fingers on one with his thumb on the other, he spotted the wrist band. It was all accurate, name and allergies, except the date. The year read 1999, a year he wasn't as alive and well.

"Fuck," he coughed out, his voice hoarse. Cancer had just planted itself back into his stomach at the time, something more vicious than before. Chemotherapy was a failure, leaving him only weak and fragile while the cells continued to multiply at a rate faster than anyone expected. Thank God he caught it in time, the doctors said, we didn’t expect for it to come back.

Peter was asleep on his lap. Tony reached to touch the small boy, his body small enough to fit across the small width of his legs at the time.

There was someone stirring beside him. The cushions of the chair creaking before they finally spoke.

"You're woke."

 _Pepper_ , he sighed with relief.

"What's the matter?"

Tony didn't know why he felt like crying, he felt the grief spinning it's webs around his mind as the lump in his throat quivered. Maybe it was the threat of death, the realization that this was simply a memory of a time he thought would be the end during the actual time of it still possibly being the end. Then, there was a single tear followed by more and more until he could no longer see his son but only a blur of a figure.

"I don't want to die," the words felt rehearsed, like something he said a million times before but never fully felt secure in.

Pepper was closer now, her hand on his cheek with her face only inches away. The tears were rolling over and through her fingers.

"Hey, hey, Tony, look at me. Who said anyone was dying?" Tony wanted to smile, maybe laugh but he couldn't. "You're not going to die. You see that baby right there? You're gonna be around long enough to see him graduate, and see his kids, and maybe his kids kids and you'll be so happy, and so healthy. Okay?"

 _But it's all a dream_ , he wanted to yell, _it's all a dream and I could die right now and I'll never be able to see his graduation._

"I don't want to forget all of you," he sobbed, "I don't want this to be it. I finally have it all and it cost me my life and I'd rather sacrifice a finger or my soul, just, just not this," he seemed hysterical but it all made sense to him.

Pepper's hands were so tight on his cheeks, Peter so perfect on the span of his skinny thighs, Steve's image at the front of his brain. He didn't want to let these things go. It just wasn’t time to let them go, not like this, not right now, not right when his life started having a purpose again.

Pepper kissed his forehead. "I love you. I love you so much."

Tony managed to smile, weak and unsure but a smile nonetheless. His eyes closing then opening to a teenaged Peter doing the same. “I love you, Dad. You know that.”

Another blink, and there was Steve. His lips pursed into a grin. It was his last hospital bed, the one where Rhodey wasn't that far away and the state of his fate was a few floors below. Steve was there, though, in his arms. His eyes were wide, the moon shining unto his skin with the sun shining from between his cheeks.

"I don't want to die, Steve, " Tony sobbed as he pulled him closer.

"I don't want you to either."

H found comfort in their embrace crying into his chest until he was all out of tears. There was silence hovering above them, devouring them as he finally settled into sleep.

“Clear!”

The jolt of electricity shot throughout his entire body.  His heart felt like … nothing. He felt nothing and that feeling all on its own made him afraid. Another jolt, his mouth opening to yell but nothing coming out. Finally, he opened his eyes.

He opened his eyes to nothing. Instead of being in the arms of the man he loved, being inside the warm comfort of his mothers womb, being enveloped in the happy memory of meeting his son or meeting his wife, he was floating in outer space.

Tony began to accept his fate as the cold came for him. The universe was cruel like that, granting him a second chance to only give him death when he finally wanted to live. God hated him, he was sure of it. He wasn’t picked on by the big guy but he was more than certain that God fund humor in his demise. Tony felt the cold overcoming, starting from his toes and slowly moving up his legs to his chest. This was it, alone in the vast of space to relish in his memories of those he loved the most, and the least. He wasn't ready, he just wasn't ready no matter how sure he felt a month ago or even ten years ago, he wasn't ready to say goodbye to them all. Another jolt came, his eyes pinching tight before he opened them to still feel the chill crawling through his veins.

It was so cold. His eyes began to gloss, his fingers tightening, his legs stuck as they were before, and finally Tony closed his eyes, the last breath in his lungs going out as he whispered, "Goodnight."

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> i was thinking about the million of things that Steve was thinking baout during the surgery and I thought about what if Tony felt it all and then I felt like that was too cruel, he was asleep, but .. what was _he_ dreaming about? and finally, it came to me, it'd only be peter, pepper, and steve. he'd only care about them and maybe one or two bad flashes from his parents. and so yeah. i hate that his last thought was Maria telling him that but it's not his fault really, blame howard. and yeah, that's it.
> 
> comments are always highly appreciated and i hope this is something that doesn't hurt too bad.


End file.
